


Step One

by SilenceIsGolden15



Series: Bad Things Happen Bingo 2k19 [7]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Bad Things Happen Bingo, Emotional/Psychological Abuse, Foster Kid Keith (Voltron), Gen, Hugs, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Keith (Voltron) Has Anxiety, Panic Attacks, Pranks and Practical Jokes, Prompt: Prank gone wrong
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-18
Updated: 2019-12-18
Packaged: 2021-02-26 10:40:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,211
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21848344
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SilenceIsGolden15/pseuds/SilenceIsGolden15
Summary: Keith's fight or flight reflex is legendary, but it doesn't always fire correctly.
Relationships: Keith & Lance (Voltron)
Series: Bad Things Happen Bingo 2k19 [7]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1554010
Comments: 16
Kudos: 586
Collections: Bad Things Happen Bingo





	Step One

“What the  _ hell  _ are you doing up there?”

Lance looked down at him from where he was perched, balanced precariously on top of two chairs to reach the vent above the door. In one hand he held a cup, which he had tilted towards the vent like he was pouring something into it, and in the other was one of Pidge’s experimental control tablets. 

“Oh, hey Keith,” he said, turning back to his task with a smirk. “Nothing much, just setting up the best prank the Castle of Lions has ever seen.”

_ Of course.  _ Keith rolled his eyes and leaned against the door he’d entered through, crossing his arms over his chest. 

“What, you think Alteans didn’t pull pranks?”

“Definitely not,” Lance answered. “I love Allura, but I doubt she’s ever had anything resembling fun.”

“So this prank is for Allura, then?”

Lance chuckled, tipping more of whatever was in the cup into the vent. “Nah, this is for Pidge. I’m putting a bunch of that weird flour Hunk bought at the space mall in the vent, then when she walks in I’ll hit the A/C and  _ whoosh!”  _ He gestured grandly, making the improvised ladder wobble and a few clumps of flour float to the floor. “One very dusty Pidgeon.”

Keith studied the set up. It was simple, but when the chairs were away it would be nearly undetectable, which was good for a prank. 

“Only one problem,” he said, jabbing his finger at the door. “How do you know she’ll use that door?”

Apparently satisfied with his work, Lance began to clamber back down to the floor. His voice wobbled slightly with the movements as he said, “Because she always does. Every day after lunch she goes to the lab, then passes through here on her way to Green’s hangar. She’s like you, a creature of habit.” He shot another smirk in Keith’s direction that made him shift a little on his feet-- he may need to start alternating his routes, just in case Lance got any ideas about pranking him next. 

“Well, I came in here to read,” Keith said as he pushed off of the door and headed for the couch. “If anyone asks, I had nothing to do with this.”

“Sure, sure.” Lance wasn’t even paying attention anymore, too focused on putting the chairs back where they belonged. 

So Keith settled himself on the couch with the book in his lap to read. It was in tablet format, but in Altean light blue rather than the orange of Pidge’s prototypes. He couldn’t say that Altean literature really made any sense, even after being translated, but the absurdity of it all was amusing, and it was a decent way to pass time. 

He’d just gotten settled into the story when Lance vaulted over the couch, landing right next to Keith and jostling his whole body.

“Dude,” he said disapprovingly, but Lance had already slid from the couch to the floor, smothering silent chuckles. 

“Shhh,” he told Keith with a mischievous grin. “She can’t know I’m in here.”

Keith rolled his eyes, but obligingly turned back to his book without arguing. 

For a while there was peaceful silence. Keith didn’t necessarily understand the plot of the book he was reading, but that didn’t stop him from being sucked in until he forgot about Lance sitting quietly on the floor, clutching his control tablet and waiting more patiently than he ever had before. 

Keith had just passed the fiftieth page when a hiss stirred the air; the sound of the centermost door sliding open. He heard Lance’s excited inhale, then there was a dull hum from somewhere deep in the Castle as he activated the air circulation system. 

A moment later someone cried out in surprise, so loudly it made Keith jump, and then someone shouted,  _ “Lance!”  _ so sharply it made shudders shoot down his spine. But it wasn’t Pidge’s voice.

When Keith looked up it was Allura’s enraged face he saw, silver hair and dark skin covered in white powder. Her eyes sparkled with fury and Keith let his book slide unnoticed to the floor as his stomach dropped out of his body. Suddenly he felt cold, all the way to his shaking fingertips, but he dared not move. 

And Lance… Lance was laughing. 

“Holy shit,” he gasped out, doubled over as he struggled to speak through his laughter. “Sorry-- sorry Princess, that wasn’t meant for you, but Jesus-- my plan worked a charm, didn’t it Keith?”

Allura turned her gaze on Keith. He didn’t know what Lance was doing-- how could he be laughing? Didn’t he see the danger signals on Allura’s face, couldn’t he feel the tension in the air? Allura was  _ pissed,  _ but he didn’t seem bothered in the slightest. 

So Keith defaulted to his basic survival instinct when confronted with an angry authority; he clenched his fists to hide the shaking, fastened his eyes on a spot on the wall beside Allura’s head, and plastered a blank look on his face.

Don’t react. Getting upset would only make her angrier. If he played this right he could get out with nothing more than a few angry words and be spared the shouting session. And if Lance got his shit together and realized the situation they were in.

“Keith?” she asked. A chill ran through him and disappeared into the pit of his stomach. “Did you have anything to do with this?”

Lance was still laughing at how silly the Princess looked all covered in flour, but all Keith could see was the anger as he searched for an answer.

The truth was no, he hadn’t. But even if he said that Allura would likely make him stay and shout at them both, just so that Keith would know better than to try anything like it himself. In that case he should lie and say it was his idea; he used to do it all the time in the group home to spare the younger boys from the caretaker’s wrath. He hated seeing them cry-- the woman would only yell more when they did that, ordering them to stop, but of course they couldn’t help it. 

Allura was still glaring at him, but Lance had apparently already decided his answer. 

“Nah, he just walked in at the wrong time,” he said, wiping tears of mirth from the corners of his eyes. “It was meant for Pidge, but honestly this was even better.”

Through the fear Keith barely registered confusion. How could Lance be so flippant? Allura looked back at him and Keith tensed every muscle so tightly it hurt, waiting for the beration to begin, but all she did was sigh and shake her head. 

“Obviously you have too much time on your hands,” she said evenly. Behind her mask Keith could still see anger swirling-- she was being diplomatic, as she’d been taught to be. “I’ll make sure to schedule extra training sessions to make up for it.”

“Aw, Allura,” Lance whined, and Keith’s fingernails drilled into his palms. 

_ Shut up, idiot!  _ He screamed mentally.  _ She’s letting you off easy!  _

Allura gave Lance a smug, satisfied smile, and with a light cloud of white powder trailing behind her, continued on her way through the lounge and out the other door. 

Keith breathed out, but not all the way. In some ways this was worse; now he’d be walking on eggshells for the rest of the day, trying to avoid setting her off. They’d avoided her anger for now, but the other shoe would drop eventually, and all he’d be able to think about was not being the one to get squished beneath it. 

“Man, that was great,” said Lance, somehow still missing the point. “Did you see her face when--” He turned to Keith, but suddenly stopped speaking when he saw his face, his expression dropping into concern. “Woah, dude, are you ok? You look pretty pale. I mean, more than usual.”

Keith forced a shaky breath in and out. He still felt cold and trembly and like he wanted to hide and never come out, but it was fine. He was fine. After all, it could’ve been worse. 

“I’m fine,” he said, though not daring to meet Lance’s eyes lest the tears he could feel building slipped out. “It was just yelling.” It was the same thing he always told the other boys, but Lance didn’t know that. He didn’t know the danger he’d been in. So he just looked confused. 

“Huh? She didn’t yell-- I mean, she kinda shouted my name, I guess, but--”

“Yeah,” Keith interrupted, “You’re right, she didn’t really yell.”  _ Not yet,  _ he added in his mind, but didn’t say it out loud. Lance had already proven that he didn’t understand the severity of their position, and his crush on Allura was public knowledge. If Keith bad-mouthed her he might get mad, too, and it was going to be hard enough tip-toeing around Allura, just enough to avoid her wrath but not obviously enough to make her angry at the implication that he was scared of her and therefore thought she was a bad person, without worrying about Lance on top of it. 

The burn behind his eyes grew. He had to get somewhere private, quickly, before he cracked and drew attention to himself. 

“Are you sure you’re ok?” Lance had been asking while Keith got lost in his fevered thoughts of strategy. “You look like you saw a ghost, and I think you’re shaking--”

Keith jerked away when Lance reached out for him. His chest was heaving as his breath began to quicken; the old feeling was bearing down on him, the feeling an oppressive, smothering quiet and a never ending pit in his stomach and the sound of angry footsteps approaching his door. 

“I’m gonna go, um-- I’m gonna go.” He just barely remembered to pick up the book from the floor before making a hasty retreat from the lounge. 

He tried to steady himself as he headed towards his bunk. It was a useless effort. The panic already had its grip on him, crawling up from his stomach and tingling fingertips, up his cold arms and stiff neck, gathering to burn behind his eyes. The first tear slid down his cheek just as he opened the door to his bunk and ducked inside.

He bit the inside of his cheek to keep quiet as they flowed, one after another. Putting the book down silently on his desk, he dropped onto his bed and pressed the pillow to his face, letting the cloth soak up the warm liquid as it fell. 

It was stupid. He knew that. Even if Allura had yelled, which she didn’t, it wasn’t as though she would have hit him or anything. The caretaker never did, either-- she only hit him once, and it was his fault for mouthing off. He had no reason to be reacting like this, and if anyone saw him they’d doubtless be annoyed. 

He took a few deep breaths, in and out, and let the pillow soak up the tears he couldn’t manage to keep inside. He still had a few hours before dinner, before he’d have to see Allura again, so he should use it to calm down.

That plan was shattered to pieces by a knock on his bedroom door. 

Instantly his veins filled with ice water, his heart picking up speed against his rib cage. It only got worse when he heard Allura’s voice on the other side. 

“Keith?” she called as he frantically scrubbed his cheeks clean and shoved his pillow back in place. “May I have a word?”

“Um, yes, uh, come in.” His voice was hoarse, but all Keith could do was pray he didn’t look like he’d been crying as Allura entered the room. She was clean now, all the flour gone, and seemed more composed. Still, Keith wasn’t going to let his guard down. He already knew what was coming. 

“About what happened in the lounge,” she began, and Keith tasted blood when he bit his cheek. This was it. “I was wondering… is Lance angry with me?”

“Uh…”

_ Huh? _

Allura twisted her fingers together, not meeting Keith’s eyes in an odd reversal of roles. “I don’t know much about Earth and its cultures. Was all of that a symbolic way of saying he’s displeased?”

All at once the pressure eased, so quickly it made him feel a bit giddy. He was glad he happened to be sitting down. 

“Oh, uh, no. No, he’s not mad at you. Humans-- sometimes we play jokes on each other, for fun. It’s not meant to be hurtful or anything, just funny. And like Lance said, it was meant for Pidge.”

An expression of relief came over Allura’s face. “Thank the Ancients,” she sighed, and her lips curled into a grateful smile. “Thank you, Keith.”

“Y-yeah.” Keith was still reeling. “No problem.”

“I’ll see you at dinner,” Allura said cheerfully, then gave him a little nod and swept out the door. 

Keith sat there for a long time, feeling strangely like he was in the center of a maze. A maze with no way out. 

* * *

Ultimately it was Pidge who suggested he talk to Keith. Lance had been against it at first, thinking it was a revenge tactic for his attempted prank, but Pidge’s logic of “none of us were there, so you know the most about it, and if you don’t figure it out we’re gonna be hearing about it for months” was irrefutable. Which is how Lance found himself outside Keith’s bunk before dinner, trying to convince himself to knock. 

It took a few minutes. Twice he almost decided against it and walked away, but both times he remembered the way Keith had looked when Allura had come into the room. How quickly his cheeks went white, how much his muscles tensed, how still he went. 

Eventually, he knocked. 

“Come in.” Well, Keith’s voice didn’t sound any different. With a last bracing breath, Lance entered the room. 

Keith was sitting cross-legged on his desk chair, reading the same tablet he’d been on earlier. He didn’t look up as Lance came in, keeping his eyes firmly locked on the electronic page, though the slight tilt of his head told Lance that he was listening. 

“Hey,” he began, then faltered. He was planning on asking if Keith was alright, but he’d already tried that and Keith had given his usual answer. He couldn’t dance around this one-- he just had to ask, point blank, and read his reaction. 

“What happened in the lounge today?”

Keith paused in his reading. Then he clenched his jaw and gave a rather forced looking roll of his eyes. 

“You know the answer to that, you’re the one who orchestrated the whole thing.”

“I meant after Allura came in.” 

This time Keith didn’t answer, and Lance let the silence hang for almost a minute before continuing. 

“You were scared, weren’t you? What were you scared of?”

He saw a muscle tick in Keith’s jaw as he ground his teeth. “I wasn’t scared.” But his eyes were focused on the floor, not on Lance or his book, and his knuckles were white where he gripped the tablet. 

“Liar,” Lance accused, only to regret it when Keith gave a barely perceptible flinch. He gentled his tone when he continued, “You know Allura would never hurt us, especially over something so dumb. You do know that, don’t you?”

“Yes, Lance, I know that.” Keith’s voice was tight and icy, trying not to snap. “Is that all you have to say?”

Ok, now he was getting irritated. Here he was trying to have a mature emotional discussion, and Keith was still trying to do his stupid lone wolf thing. Well, it wasn’t going to work, not this time. 

Lance folded his arms over his chest. “If you know that, then why were you scared?”

“I wasn’t scared!”

“Liar!”

With a frustrated growl, Keith tossed his tablet onto his bed and stood, getting in Lance’s face without hesitation. This was the Keith he knew, not the stone statue he’d become during the confrontation with Allura. 

“What the hell do you want from me?” he snarled. “I know Allura wasn’t going to hurt us. I’m not scared of her, and I’m not scared of you, either.” 

“Then what are you scared of?”

“It’s none of your damn business!” 

“Just tell me!”

“Fine!” Keith exclaimed, throwing his hands in the air. “Fine, I don’t-- I thought she was going to yell at us and I don’t like being yelled at. Happy now?” He folded his arms and scowled, but Lance was only more confused now. 

“But I was just yelling at you,” he said with a puzzled frown. “You didn’t act the way you did then.”

Keith sighed. All of his anger seemed to have abandoned him, and now he just looked tired. 

“She’s the princess, Lance,” he mumbled. “She’s in charge.”

Lance blinked, taking a moment to process. Keith wasn’t looking at him anymore; he’d picked a random corner and was glaring into it. 

“I know it’s stupid,” said Keith, much more quietly now. “Yelling isn’t that bad. It could’ve been way worse. I know that, and I know it’s not fair to Allura for me to act this way. But--”

“Wait, wait wait wait, hold on.” Lance held up one finger, cutting Keith off in the middle of a sentence and earning himself a frustrated huff. “I don’t know if you know this, but when I started middle school I had to go to therapy for about two years.” 

“What does that have to do with--”

“Ap-bup-bup-bup, I’m talking.” Keith scrunched up his mouth into his grumpy scowl, but Lance went on regardless. “And you know what I learned from her? Absolutely everyone who has trauma has said that it wasn’t that bad. Every. Single. One.”

Keith merely looked annoyed at this revelation. “It’s not trauma, Lance, I just got yelled at a lot. That’s normal.”

At this Lance finally lost his accusatory stance. He couldn’t help it; if that was what Keith thought of as normal, Lance could only imagine what he had tucked away in the recesses of his mind. 

“But you were a kid, right?” Cautiously, Keith nodded. “And when you’re a kid, being yelled at is scary. That kind of thing leaves a mark.”

For a moment Keith just stared at him, something lost in his eyes. Then he started to fidget, running his thumb over his knuckles and looking everywhere in the room except for Lance’s face, like he was hoping someone had written the answer for this conversation somewhere. 

Lance couldn’t resist anymore. With a gentle, but hopefully warm, exclamation of “Come here, Mullet,” he grabbed Keith’s wrist and pulled him into an embrace. 

At first he just stood there, frozen. Then, ever so slowly, he felt Keith’s fingertips resting on his back. Then they tightened, and before long they were full on hugging in the middle of Keith’s bedroom as he buried his face into Lance’s shoulder. 

Hugging wouldn’t solve Keith’s problem, of course. But all things considered, Lance thought it was a pretty good step one. 


End file.
